Dragons
Dragons Largely considered creatures of myth, true dragons only live in the far north, beyond the kingdoms of Domhain Byd. There are many different breeds spoken of in legend, but what's true and what's the fabrication of imagination is difficult to say. In Mekti, it's commonly said that true dragons fly, eat flesh, and breath fire. They are said to be roughly on par of intelligence with cats and with similar tendencies to play with their food. Giant skulls large enough for a man to sit inside can be found in Mekti. It is said that these are from the days when great warriors hunted dragons in the north. In truth, these "true" dragons are more like locusts. Peaceful and solitary grasshoppers will, when conditions are right, congregate together in huge swarms. Their bodies change size and shape and color. They don't just innocently eat the grass and mate and die, but ingest everything they can including one another. Under the right conditions the innocent grasshopper becomes the ravenous locust; so too does the swamp dragon become the dragon. Swamp dragon eggs are sensitive to heat. Like crocodilians and lizards, lower temperatures lead to more females hatching and higher temperatures lead to more males hatching. A sustained high heat (maintaining an average of 120°F and never dropping below 100°F) will trigger changes in the egg that go beyond sex. The wings will be proportionately larger, the body sleeker and the glands in the throat that produce gas will be developed enough to ignite flame without a heat source. Such hot-weather produced dragons grow larger than their meek brethren. They first begin to fly when they reach puberty at the age of three. At this age, they have a wingspan of ten feet and weigh around 35lbs. During the first year of flight they typically lose ten pounds of weight--body fat reserves left over from infancy--though they'll slowly regain it in muscle. At the end of that first year of flight when they've slimmed down and have yet to grow any heavier they are at their fastest flight speed in their lives, reaching top speeds of 80mph. Dragons continue to grow throughout their lives, though as they get larger and heavier taking off becomes more difficult. Those that live long enough to have a sixty-foot wingspan are only able to coast on air-currents and must climb to a height before taking off. These limitations on mobility and speed mean that few dragons live past that stage--which comes when they're around fifty years old--though there are exceptions, as evidenced by the skulls in Mekti. Most dragons mate when they are between these extremes, with a wingspan of forty-feet, a body length of twelve feet, and a weight of 300lbs. At this stage, they have a good balance between speed and strength. If anyone were to catch sight of one, it would almost assuredly be at this stage, since this is when they are most likely to risk traveling from their nesting and feeding grounds. To maintain the necessary temperatures for their eggs, dragons lay their clutches in geothermically active areas with high air temperatures. Females are very rare, leading to males fighting fiercly against one another for the right to be part of a female's harem. In turn, the few females that there are tend to fight fiercly against one another for access to suitable nesting grounds. This keeps the population of dragons low and geographically isolated. Technically speaking, true dragons have become extinct on five separate occasions. All it takes to restart their phase is for a single female swamp dragon to find a hot enough place to make her nest. During unusually hot summers, some regions have suffered from dragon swarms when the local swamp dragons began producing them. No such swarm has occurred in a thousand years, but the legends remain. The digestive upsets and weaknesses of the swamp dragons are greatly reduced in true dragons, though not completly lost. Just as the finest race horse can be felled by colic, even a true dragon can die from a gastrointestinal crisis. Sharp blows to the throat that rupture the glands there will spell certain death (and an explosion) for the dragon. Exposure to intense heat or having their mouths held closed when they were preparing to flame can have the same result. Their skin is covered in armored scales and they have tough musculature--especially through the chest to support their wings--but their bones are relatively delicate and can be broken with enough force. Category:North Category:Creatures